tombs tyrone

Megalithic court grave. Take minor road south-east from Creggan towards Pomeroy. Always accessible....

The extensive townland of Ballywholan (locally pronounced Ballyhullion), which stretches a few miles north of the Tyrone/Monaghan border, contains two chambered tombs of differing types, both close to side-roads leading westwards off the B 83 about 3 miles south-east of Clogher. Carnfadraig, just to the north of the more northerly of the two side-roads, is apparently a portal-tomb, with chambers built of large stones at each end of an 86 foot long cairn. 'Excavations' in 1897 uncovered some hum...

Cregganconroe, reached by a long lane from the nearest by-road, is a well preserved example of those court-tombs erected by Stone Age farmers in many parts of the north of Ireland around and after 3500 B.C. as communal burial places. This one is located on a small hillock, and preserves the semicircular east-facing forecourt which leads into a two-chambered burial gallery, a large capstone of which has fallen in close to the entrance. The tomb stands in a roughly rectangular cairn, which has t...

The monument's true nature as a court-tomb of c.3500 B.C. was only revealed during excavations in 1979-82, which removed the peat that had helped to preserve what turned out to be one of the most complete examples of its kind, and ensured its survival. The trapezoidal stone cairn over 50 feet long has a semicircular forecourt at its eastern end, at the centre of which a portal covered by a mighty capstone gave access to a triple-chambered burial gallery which had originally been roofed with cor...

The surviving burial chamber, roughly pentagonal in shape, would have been approached originally through a passage, of which little remains. Four of the upright stones of the chamber bear decorative motifs, including concentric circles, lozenges, zigzags and triangles, which resemble those found in the passage-tombs on the Loughcrew Hills in Co. Meath. Like them Knockmany probably dates from around 3000-2500 B.C. The chamber is now protected and locked within the (reconstructed) earthen mound...